2026-09-14 19:13:34
Anonymous:
Remove text slop: disclaimers, process metadata, restatements and hedge tags; no rule changes (owner readability review, 14 Sep)
hold the flood/player information and options.md ..
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# What the Astronaut Sees and Controls
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This is the proposed player-information design for Hold The Horde. Ordinary weapons fire mostly automatically and manual specials remain deliberate button presses—owner decisions. The journal pauses enemies and oxygen—also an owner decision. The exact display, target assistance, bindings, visual language and stage-only upgrade rhythm remain proposals. Nothing here claims tested readability or accessibility.
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This is the player-information design for Hold The Horde. Ordinary weapons fire mostly automatically and manual specials are deliberate button presses. The exact display, target assistance, bindings, visual language and stage-only upgrade rhythm are proposals. The [Owner Brief](/Hold%20The%20Flood/Brief) records the owner's decisions.
## One fight, one discovery and a way home
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This is a later expedition, after both relevant ship assemblies—the navigation coupler and thermal exchanger core—have been installed aboard, so the proposed rig has eight mounted spaces. **Carrying capacity (C)** is the shared room taken by equipment, canisters and discoveries; **active rig area (A)** is the mounted space that can operate. **Usable charge (U)** is the payload stored or passed by certain parts, not oxygen or ammunition. The astronaut enters a pressure hall with six physical parts mounted as the **7 C / 7 A Storm Choir**—Threat Sensor, Pulse Projector, Impact Dynamo, Fork Relay, Arc Emitter and Capacitor—and one proposed 2 C oxygen canister. The suit says, in words and numbers, that nine of ten carrying spaces and seven of eight mounted spaces are used. One carrying space remains for a discovery. [Mechanical Interfaces and Opening Quantities](/Hold%20The%20Flood/Mechanical%20Interfaces%20And%20Opening%20Quantities) owns the proposed amounts and acceptance rules.
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This is a later expedition, after both relevant ship assemblies—the navigation coupler and thermal exchanger core—have been installed aboard, so the rig has eight mounted spaces. **Carrying capacity (C)** is the shared room taken by equipment, canisters and discoveries; **active rig area (A)** is the mounted space that can operate. **Usable charge (U)** is the payload stored or passed by certain parts, not oxygen or ammunition. The astronaut enters a pressure hall with six physical parts mounted as the **7 C / 7 A Storm Choir**—Threat Sensor, Pulse Projector, Impact Dynamo, Fork Relay (the splitter), Arc Emitter and Capacitor—and one 2 C oxygen canister. The suit says, in words and numbers, that nine of ten carrying spaces and seven of eight mounted spaces are used. One carrying space remains for a discovery. [Mechanical Interfaces and Opening Quantities](/Hold%20The%20Flood/Mechanical%20Interfaces%20And%20Opening%20Quantities) owns the amounts and acceptance rules.
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Earlier in this same outing, resolved pressure stages offered **Echoing Arc** and **Thunderhead**, and the player chose both. They are temporary transformations of the six mounted parts, not carried objects. Neither could have survived a previous return aboard. Their stage-only acquisition remains provisional while the owner considers the regular defeated-enemy-growth alternative.
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Earlier in this same outing, resolved pressure stages offered **Echoing Arc** and **Thunderhead**, and the player chose both. They are temporary transformations of the six mounted parts, not carried objects. Neither could have survived a previous return aboard.
Before anything attacks, the hall explains where danger will come from. A ward vent bucks in its frame. A door beyond it rattles. Bodies press against the glass, and the music leaves a gap in the same direction. These cues create anticipation without drawing an enemy from nowhere. When the finite release begins, the vent and its route stay marked at their physical positions; the display does not replace them with a generic “wave” banner.
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- the rig's current operating mode and whether its visible supply can support it;
- the manual Thunderhead control, unavailable until storage and receivers are ready.
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The crowd thickens. A Flanker commits from the side gallery and its body tell gains the one peripheral direction marker. The suit reaches the player's labelled oxygen reserve at the same time, but the reserve remains anchored beside the tank; it never replaces the threat cue and never claims to know the cost or safety of returning. Projector keeps cycling. Echoing Arc widens the discharge through finite branch routes and reserves the complete action heat before firing. Bodies, cover and the route limit determine where the effect ends. Arc creates no charge and does not silently refill Capacitor.
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The crowd thickens. A Flanker commits from the side gallery and its body tell gains the one peripheral direction marker. The suit reaches the player's labelled oxygen reserve at the same time, but the reserve remains anchored beside the tank; it never replaces the threat cue and never claims to know the cost or safety of returning. Projector keeps cycling. Echoing Arc widens the discharge through its branch routes and reserves the complete action heat before firing. Bodies, cover and the route limit determine where the effect ends. Arc creates no charge and does not silently refill Capacitor.
When Capacitor reaches 4 U, Thunderhead's manual control shows one brief opportunity at the required actuators' next natural-ready instant. An early press visibly arms that opportunity and can be cancelled; no charge or heat is spent until acceptance. A shown 0.75-second lapse, cancellation or refusal releases automatic firing, and another hold then needs a fresh press. The temporary effect provides two visible, mutually gated modes on the same mounted parts: normal charging and manual burst. The player presses the special once. The rig visibly gates ordinary charging, spends the real 4 U, routes the burst through Fork to Arc and Projector, reserves its complete heat and operating demand, then restores normal charging automatically. Both charging and burst previews include effects still in flight; a cancelled or refused command spends no charge before first acceptance, while later obstruction gives no refund. The player does not open the journal to fire or restore the build. A refusing receiver is named at that part; descendants cannot recharge the same burst through Dynamo.
Had the astronaut completed the physical closure before the release committed, it would have prevented that release and awarded no combat-upgrade offer; lasting safety and access would be the payoff. Once the release commits, the finite stage ends when all attackers committed to it are cleared, or when the player completes a physical source seal that ends their access. The seal can stop committed attackers that have not crossed yet, and it resolves the stage even before the announced peak. Bodies already beyond the closure remain dangerous; quiet requires clearing or safely separating the present space. Escape earns nothing and re-entry resumes the same unresolved stage. Reopening the seal cannot pay again. [Combat Rules](/Hold%20The%20Flood/Combat%20Rules) owns the common release boundary.
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The temporary-upgrade offer opens in a pause. It shows two behaviour changes, not percentages: what mounted part changes, what the player will do differently, the added heat, power and route limits, and one situation where the choice fails. Selecting one option returns to the exact frozen moment. An unchosen offer expires on return aboard. Stage-only choices are explicitly provisional while the owner considers regular defeated-enemy growth with larger milestone transformations; no meter or threshold for that alternative is invented here.
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The temporary-upgrade offer opens in a pause. It shows two behaviour changes, not percentages: what mounted part changes, what the player will do differently, the added heat, power and route limits, and one situation where the choice fails. Selecting one option returns to the exact frozen moment. An unchosen offer expires on return aboard.
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Silence reveals the reason for entering the hall: a sample counter stamped with a date after the hospital was supposed to be empty. Framing and committing the record takes live world time. Once captured, opening the journal pauses everything. The player can zoom, compare it with Yeva's photographed wall and write “same fitting?” in their own words. The game records the images, places, dates and who said what; it does not promote the note to truth.
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Silence reveals the reason for entering the hall: a sample counter stamped with a date after the hospital was supposed to be empty. Framing and committing the record happens while the game runs. Once captured, the player opens the journal, zooms, compares it with Yeva's photographed wall and writes “same fitting?” in their own words. The game records the images, places, dates and who said what; it does not promote the note to truth.
Later, a rescue begins only after a short route has been walked and prepared and is demonstrably quiet or separated. The status says who confirmed the travel air, where the abort refuge is and whether the survivor is waiting, prepared, in transfer, at refuge or Sent. The person opens their own door and walks the short crossing while the astronaut holds one exposed junction. It is not a long escort and does not require killing every creature if a shown quiet bypass or persistent local closure made the route safe enough.
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The airlock shuts. Noise, heat and urgency fall away. Walking home leaves this arrangement intact: the resolved stage remains spent and cleared ground remains clear. The physical rig, canister contents and committed record remain; every temporary combat upgrade and pending offer ends. Whether stored Capacitor charge survives return is still unresolved and is not answered by the upgrade reset. If the astronaut had died, carried property would still return, but the unconnected station would shift once. Home is relief, then curiosity: inspect the new record, talk to the person who recognizes it, refill, and decide what one carrying unit should hold next time.
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The airlock shuts. Noise, heat and urgency fall away. Walking home leaves this arrangement intact: the resolved stage remains spent and cleared ground remains clear. The physical rig, canister contents and committed record remain; every temporary combat upgrade and pending offer ends. If the astronaut had died, carried property would still return, but the unconnected station would shift once. Home is relief, then curiosity: inspect the new record, talk to the person who recognizes it, refill, and decide what one carrying unit should hold next time.
## The attention promise
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Tank and condition keep fixed positions. Every locked threat keeps its own body tell. Only the nearest committed threat receives the single peripheral direction marker; another remains visible at its source. The active manual special, each automatic actuator's readiness/target and a live work interruption stay visible rather than taking turns.
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This is a proposal with a known failure. In the Storm Choir hall, reserve oxygen, two locked attacks, a full Capacitor, two hot parts and a capture prompt can all become active together. Drawing six equal arrows, banners and meters would bury the corridor and make the spectacular build feel like paperwork.
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A known failure case: in the Storm Choir hall, reserve oxygen, two locked attacks, a full Capacitor, two hot parts and a capture prompt can all become active together. Drawing six equal arrows, banners and meters would bury the corridor and make the spectacular build feel like paperwork.
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The design response is hierarchy, not silence: oxygen/condition stay anchored; one threat receives the peripheral bearing; other threats keep strong source-local tells; charge, heat and special availability cluster on the relevant rig parts; the context prompt yields to a locked attack but remains at the physical object; and branch diagnostics move to inspection. Effect-density damping reduces particles, never enemies, timing or state. This response itself needs later authorized observation: if players still miss the second threat or the ready special, the hierarchy—not the player's attention—must change.
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The design response is hierarchy: oxygen/condition stay anchored; one threat receives the peripheral bearing; other threats keep strong source-local tells; charge, heat and special availability cluster on the relevant rig parts; the context prompt yields to a locked attack but remains at the physical object; and branch diagnostics move to inspection. Effect-density damping reduces particles, never enemies, timing or state. If players still miss the second threat or the ready special, the hierarchy—not the player's attention—must change.
## What the journal may and may not do
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Opening the journal freezes enemies, oxygen, projectiles, readiness, warnings and unfinished world work, and completes none of them. Comparing records, writing notes, choosing a temporary offer and changing compatible links among already mounted accessible parts happen in the pause under the current proposals. Picking up, mounting or removing a physical part; operating a mechanism; transferring oxygen; moving into a view; and framing or committing a capture happen in live world time.
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Opening the journal freezes enemies, oxygen, projectiles, readiness, warnings and unfinished world work, and completes none of them. Comparing records, writing notes, choosing a temporary offer and changing compatible links among already mounted accessible parts happen in the pause. Picking up, mounting or removing a physical part; operating a mechanism; transferring oxygen; moving into a view; and framing or committing a capture happen while the game runs.
The journal has five simple places:
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| Domain | Required states and provenance | Required presentation and refusal |
|---|---|---|
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| **Body and oxygen** | Exact suit O; player-set reserve defaulting to proposed 4 O; condition/displacement; Glass Siphon tether, radius and separately labelled extra drain; selected canister with exact O and partial/ordinary-full/prepared-full/empty state; incremental coupling progress | Numeric O plus filled form and labelled notch; condition step; physical tether; exact transfer already moved. Transfer stops at suit ceiling or empty vessel, keeps committed increments, and damage alone does not cancel. Reserve never becomes a return estimate. |
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| **Carrying and rig** | Used/free C and A; active, inactive, installed and dropped location; each actuator's connected source, selected target and readiness; manual facing/availability; Capacitor 0–4 U and saturation; ordinary 2 U release availability; local heat and recovery; committed route/body/rebound/fragment/bloom allowances; current temporary upgrades and pending offer; charging/burst mode and possible concurrent demand against the visible 6/8/10 P ship supply, including each parent reservation through its last fragment and occupied ordinary/master flight slots; armed manual intent and remaining hold time; shown bank faces, terminal marker and fan cone | C and A never merge. No-target holds only that actuator. Ordinary release below 2 U or toward a refusing first receiver stops before commitment and spends nothing; a downstream failure after commitment gives no refund. Thunderhead, Foundry Drop and Furnace Burst each provide a temporary full-store 4 U command with their own stated receiver, heat, targeting and recovery checks. Automatic charging restoration grants no readiness and descendants cannot recharge their own burst. Every return removes temporary upgrades/offers while preserving physical-property rules; stored-charge survival remains undecided. See [Mechanical Interfaces](/Hold%20The%20Flood/Mechanical%20Interfaces%20And%20Opening%20Quantities). |
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| **Body and oxygen** | Exact suit O; player-set reserve defaulting to 4 O; condition/displacement; Glass Siphon tether, radius and separately labelled extra drain; selected canister with exact O and partial/ordinary-full/prepared-full/empty state; incremental coupling progress | Numeric O plus filled form and labelled notch; condition step; physical tether; exact transfer already moved. Transfer stops at suit ceiling or empty vessel, keeps committed increments, and damage alone does not cancel. Reserve never becomes a return estimate. |
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| **Carrying and rig** | Used/free C and A; active, inactive, installed and dropped location; each actuator's connected source, selected target and readiness; manual facing/availability; Capacitor 0–4 U and saturation; ordinary 2 U release availability; local heat and recovery; committed route/body/rebound/fragment/bloom allowances; current temporary upgrades and pending offer; charging/burst mode and possible concurrent demand against the visible 6/8/10 P ship supply, including each parent reservation through its last fragment and occupied ordinary/master flight slots; armed manual intent and remaining hold time; shown bank faces, terminal marker and fan cone | C and A never merge. No-target holds only that actuator. Ordinary release below 2 U or toward a refusing first receiver stops before commitment and spends nothing; a downstream failure after commitment gives no refund. Thunderhead, Foundry Drop and Furnace Burst each provide a temporary full-store 4 U command with their own stated receiver, heat, targeting and recovery checks. Automatic charging restoration grants no readiness and descendants cannot recharge their own burst. See [Mechanical Interfaces](/Hold%20The%20Flood/Mechanical%20Interfaces%20And%20Opening%20Quantities). |
| **Equipment editing** | Physical pickup/mount/removal state; direct link validity; every mutually exclusive/gated operating mode and its peak demand | Physical work runs live and may be interrupted; mounted-link preview/edit is paused. Invalid or unsafe proposal changes nothing. Preview explains structure and demand, including Rebound's launch/Barrier interlock. It distinguishes a firing delay from an invalid link. Bank/reflected lines, terminal/fan shape and static cover breaks can be inspected; moving bodies can change the actual hit after commitment. |
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| **Work and reward stage** | Mechanism stage, completed checkpoints, exact commit/spend, interruption cause; actual host withdrawal face and neutral warning on re-entry; physical crowd source; finite stage uncommitted/unresolved/spent; seal state separately from present-space quiet | Cancel/displacement/occupied control loses only unfinished work; damage alone does not. Crossing the authored host face resets only that mechanism's temporary phase; re-entry begins at its visible neutral warning while completed work and spent reward stages persist. Pre-commit closure prevents a release with no offer; after commitment, early clear/seal resolves it. Escape, return and load do not create a reward. See [Encounter and Mechanism Placement](/Hold%20The%20Flood/Encounter%20And%20Mechanism%20Placement%20Inventory). |
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| **Work and reward stage** | Mechanism stage, completed checkpoints, exact commit/spend, interruption cause; actual host withdrawal face and neutral warning on re-entry; physical crowd source; finite stage uncommitted/unresolved/spent; seal state separately from present-space quiet | Cancel/displacement/occupied control loses only unfinished work; damage alone does not. Crossing the host face resets only that mechanism's temporary phase; re-entry begins at its visible neutral warning while completed work and spent reward stages persist. Pre-commit closure prevents a release with no offer; after commitment, early clear/seal resolves it. Escape, return and load do not create a reward. See [Encounter and Mechanism Placement](/Hold%20The%20Flood/Encounter%20And%20Mechanism%20Placement%20Inventory). |
| **Threat and crowd** | Hostile awareness/facing; locked wind-up and bearing; Caller/alarm; answering physical aperture; attackers committed to a release and bodies that have already crossed | Body motion/shape plus directional form and named sound subtitle. Stopping a Caller/alarm before commitment prevents the release. A completed physical closure can stop committed attackers that have not crossed; bodies already beyond it remain locally dangerous. No unseen spawn or generic omniscient warning. |
| **Place and evidence** | Current room and entrances directly seen; fixed ship dock after a shift; unseen space beyond it; breadcrumb traversed this life; historical route/adjacency; unknown route; capture progress; multiple dated captures; fixed-instrument live report versus carried snapshot | Current and historical use different line forms and words. Interrupted capture yields no record; a new capture preserves earlier records. Instrument reports name anchor, time and limit and give no distance, path, safety or remote diagnosis. Alien script is never translated automatically. |
| **Station joining** | A/B/R face family; flow direction and transform sides; join attempt result; walking, latch and diagnostic-power states; joined/discovered-unjoined/anonymous roster counts | Family uses mark count and outline, direction uses arrowheads, not colour alone. Mismatch refuses without spending or changing a join. Walking, latch and diagnostic remain three separate readings. Roster names no unseen room or route. |
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## Controls and accessibility proposals
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Bindings and defaults are proposals, not a compliance claim. Every option must preserve the information in the table above.
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Every option must preserve the information in the table above.
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| Option | Proposed default | Non-negotiable result | Cost to watch |
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| Option | Default | Non-negotiable result | Cost to watch |
|---|---|---|---|
| Full remapping; no required three-input chord | On | Every action and pause remains reachable; staged work requires no rapid repeated input | More control paths to explain |
| Hold/toggle choice for staged work and oxygen coupling | Hold | Same checkpoints, interruption and commitment | Toggle may reduce physical tension |
| Field-detail density | Reduced | Survival, threats, per-actuator readiness/target, manual special, source, heat/storage, visible effect paths and active interaction remain; branch history moves to inspection | A refusal may be diagnosed after the moment |
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General options-menu pausing remains undecided. Only the journal pause is owner-selected. If another menu pauses, the option must say so consistently rather than create a hidden safer pause.
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The owner has not yet reacted to the proposed defaults for directional markers, effect intensity, horde-density damping or field-detail density. Those four rows remain usable proposals for independent design work, not selected settings.
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## Open decisions and validation boundary
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Still open: stage-only versus regular defeated-enemy growth; target override and aiming assistance; final power, heat and coverage tuning; general menu pause; save slots; survivor-transfer safeguard; final station-joining and departure rules; and the exact visual/audio treatment for every creature, mechanism and part.
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This design can require that information be present and traceable. It cannot establish that a player notices it, that six simultaneous cues are tolerable, that a horde remains readable under effect density, or that the options preserve excitement. Those claims require a later authorized implementation and observation phase.
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If another menu pauses, the option must say so consistently rather than create a hidden safer pause.
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## Open questions
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- Stage-only upgrade acquisition versus regular defeated-enemy growth with larger milestone transformations.
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- Target override and aiming assistance.
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- Final power, heat and coverage tuning.
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- General options-menu pausing.
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- Save slots.
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- The survivor-transfer safeguard (pending owner decision).
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- Final station-joining and departure rules.
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- The exact visual/audio treatment for every creature, mechanism and part.
